Working from Home: Virtual Meetings, Inertia and Bullies

About half of the articles I read about the productivity of workers working from home make it sound like it’s the greatest thing since sliced bread. The other half point to declining efficiency as the weeks and months go by. Regardless, the zeitgeist proclaims that working from home is here to stay – there is no going back. The zombie mobs go along because that is what they do.  

In 2009, IBM had 40% of its 386,000 employees in 173 countries working remotely.

Why then, in March of 2017, did IBM pull its workers back into the workplace? Was it the move of a company whose profits had fallen? Something had triggered other companies like Yahoo, Aetna and Best Buy to also pull their employees back into the office. Prior to the pandemic, corporations like Apple and Google passed on telecommuting in the first place.

Why?

Collaboration works better when people are around each other – physically. We have more trust in people who shake our hand, pat us on the back or otherwise appropriately touch us.  

In face-to-face encounters, our brains process facial expressions and physical movement in addition to vocal cues. We rely on nonverbal feedback to help us gauge how well our ideas are being accepted. When we are denied these interpersonal cues, the brain struggles, and communication suffers.

Face-to-face encounters are where innovation takes place. Innovation is rarely the outcome of any formal meeting, and even more rarely the product of virtual meetings. It is more difficult to build trust in virtual teams and easier for misunderstandings to occur.

Our brains are struggling, communication suffers, and we don’t know how our ideas are being accepted. No wonder we burn out.

Inertia and Bullies

Inertia is the resistance of any physical object to any change in its velocity. This includes changes to the object's speed, or direction of motion. An aspect of this property is the tendency of objects to keep moving in a straight line at a constant speed, when no forces act upon them.

The way inertia impacts remote workers during a crisis such as the pandemic is that workers tend to focus more on tactical activities — handling a consistent number of calls, answering the right number of questions or following the approved project plan — rather than adapting to solve the bigger, newer problems the business may be facing.

Breaking inertia can happen when workers are motivated by potential reward for change that is stronger than the comfort of staying in the current state. The fear of the unknown will keep people stuck. Paint a vision of what a better place looks like. People must understand why they are doing something and emotionally buy into the rewards they will experience. As an old boss used to say, “don’t tell someone how to do something, make them want to do it and they will find 10 ways to do it that you never thought of.”

In addition to having insecurities about keeping their job, virtual meeting attendees often sit back and keep their head down – while bullies take over the meetings.   

Companies have a responsibility to end bullying at the systemic level. However, individuals who are bullied are not the ones who need to define the solution.

Companies should ensure a confidential, safe way for employees to escalate bullying complaints. Companies must create safe, productive workplaces, promptly identify overbearing behavior and proactively address it.

Very few workers, including managers, have received enough training to overcome struggles with the brain, breaking down inertia or how to ensure productive meetings without bullies.

Following are some tips to consider the next time you are responsible for or attending a virtual meeting:

1. Have participants describe their surroundings and anything going on that might distract from the meeting.

2. Start with small talk prior to diving into business. This fills in time if someone is late and allows for corrections to be made if there is a technology glitch.

3. Assign tasks prior to the meeting and then have all participants report on their assignments.

4. Make sure introverts participate by going around the room at the end of the meeting and asking for feedback on the meeting and actions agreed upon. 

5. Email a meeting recap with discussion items, decisions and assignments for the next meeting.

Managers have the tendency to see what they want to see rather than what is there. While you cannot overcome the inherent disadvantages of virtual meetings for those working from home, a little preparation and courtesy will go a long way toward keeping a challenging situation from getting worse. 

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